“The Dashboard”
for Managers of Sterile Insect Technique
Production Facilities A Mass-Rearing Metrics and Monitoring Tool
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
International Atomic Energy Agency
Vienna, 2018
Edited by:
Pedro Rendón of the IAEA-TCLA, Alicia Aldana from the Moscamed
Programme in Guatemala, and Carlos Cáceres of the Joint FAO/IAEA
Programme on Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture.
DISCLAIMER
The mention of specific companies or a certain manufacturers’ products in this
document does not imply that they are endorsed or recommended by the
FAO/IAEA in preference to others of a similar nature that are not mentioned.
CONTENTS
1- Introduction ………………………………………………………………… 1
2- Excel Spreadsheet Structure ……………………………………………….. 4
3- SECTION A - The Manager’s Dashboard – Weekly Production Targets and
Quality Control Performance …………………………………………… 5
4- SECTION B - Technical - Dashboard Production Graphs ……………. 6
5- SECTION C - Daily and Weekly Data Entry for Production and Quality Control
Graphs in The Managers Dashboard ………………………………………. 7
6- SECTION D - Daily / Weekly Production Data Collection Form …………..… 10
7- SECTION E - Production and quality control standards ……………………… 15
1
“The Dashboard” for Managers of Insect Production Facilities A Mass-Rearing Metrics and Monitoring Tool
Introduction
Nowadays, large-scale rearing of insects has gained considerable interest as an environment-
friendly strategy for pest control, through the production of beneficial insects, such as
parasitoids, predators, pollinators, sterile insects and other beneficial organisms, as well as an
alternative source of animal protein for feed and food.
Rearing operations, in general, are an intricate activity that requires a well-designed process
control to ensure that the daily investment in artificial diets, supplies, personnel, operations and
equipment, as well as other resources committed to the mass-production, yield the expected
outcomes in terms of quantity, quality and production cost-effectiveness. In order that
managers can monitor the main production components and make well-informed decisions, it
is necessary that data generated during the production process be compiled and transformed
into useful information that goes beyond the usual statistical analysis (averages and standard
deviations), which often do not allow observing trends relevant to correcting and optimizing
production processes.
Most textbooks on statistical methods, and most statistical computer programmes, pay too little
attention to graphs. Graphs can have various purposes, such as: (i) to help us perceive and
appreciate some broad features of the data, (ii) to let us look behind those broad features and
see what other trends are there. Most kinds of statistical calculation rest on assumptions about
the behaviour of the data. Those assumptions may be false, and then the calculations may be
misleading. We ought always to try to check whether the assumptions are reasonably correct;
and if they are wrong we ought to be able to perceive in what ways they are wrong. Graphs are
very valuable for these purposes as was described by Anscombe, 1973
(http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/gerstman/StatPrimer/anscombe1973.pdf).
The Excel spreadsheet and graphic display for this “Dashboard” has been designed as a
working tool, primarily for managers and staff at mass-production facilities to facilitate
monitoring insect rearing operations. It can also be used to monitor performance of small scale
colonies and to carry out strain comparisons. This “Mass-Rearing Metrics and Monitoring
Tool” allows managers to monitor daily production performance of their mass-rearing facility
in a “Dashboard” format.
Managers and rearing technicians can be easily overwhelmed by the large volume of
information generated by various production processes. Presenting production trends in an
organized, dashboard-style brings much value to facility and programme managers.
By definition, a dashboard is a visual display of data collected to monitor conditions and to
facilitate understanding of the process described. Dashboards are commonly used in industrial
production and are suited to monitoring industrial production of insects. This Excel-based
monitoring system displays Key Performance Parameters (“KPP’s”) showing production and
quality trends in simple, easy to interpret graphs. This Excel monitoring system and graph
display “dashboard” can also be used to predict or model different production scenarios and
compare them to actual or proposed operations.
Monitoring operation activities helps to quickly identify production problems (Figure 1), take
corrective actions, and measure their impact in improving processes. Monitoring also
http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/gerstman/StatPrimer/anscombe1973.pdf
2
strengthens process planning and implementation, use of resources, supervision in general, and
invites participation by staff at all levels of the insect rearing operation, as well as all operations
linked to Sterile Insect Technique (SIT) application. A stable production process, with known
performance measurements, provides better control over production output, leading to reduced
overall operational cost.
Thus, the aim in designing this Excel monitoring system is to facilitate managerial and
technical decisions regarding the performance of insect rearing operations. The examples given
and data entry are set-up for an Anastrepha ludens mass-production. However, initial data entry
(user input in SECTIONS C and D) can be adjusted for other Tephritidae fruit flies or for non-
tephritid species.
Feedback regarding potential improvements of the “Dashboard” is encouraged and greatly
appreciated in order to achieve greater utility of this monitoring tool.
Key Performance Parameters (KPPs)
Key Performance Parameters (KPPs) reflect the production and quality objectives of a given
production or quality unit. These production and quality goals are defined parameters that aim
to address a well-studied field requirement. To consistently produce a predictable quality of
insects, attention should be paid to the process that produces them (i.e. process control of the
production process). To be able to monitor the production and productivity of rearing facilities,
it is necessary to agree on a set of performance parameters and rearing practices, similar to
what has been achieved for the quality control of the final product (http://www-
naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/QualityCo).
The mass-rearing production process showing the areas where key performance parameters
and values need to be monitored for process control is shown in Figure 1.
KPP’s must be measurable and represent critical success factors. Production performance and
quality parameters should be monitored and maintained at an efficient level, allowing the
introduction of corrections when deviations from the established performance requirement are
observed. These production and quality performance parameters should be established for all
of the processes that are required during the mass-rearing. Examples of KPP’s include:
➢ Amount of eggs produced and used per time ➢ Larval yield in relation to the amount of diet prepared ➢ Overall pupal yield ➢ Egg to pupae conversion ➢ Percent of male pupae in Genetic Sexing Strains (GSS) ➢ Pupal weight ➢ Adult emergence ➢ Flight ability ➢ Adult survival under stress conditions.
Performance targets need to be set by users for each KPP (input in SECTION C and D). Over
time, KPP target values can be adjusted in response to process control and production
monitoring to more accurately reflect actual needs and results in terms of insect quantity and
quality for each separate process.
http://www-naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/QualityCohttp://www-naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/QualityCo
3
Figure 1. Mass-rearing production process showing areas (in red) where key performance
parameters and values need to be collected to monitor the productivity of the production
process.
4
Excel Spreadsheet Structure
This monitoring tool contains a set of spreadsheets which collect and process data to present
two dashboards for separate target audience: 1) The “Manager’s Dashboard” (SECTION A),
which includes the weekly production target graphs, as well as the weekly quality control
performance; and 2) The “Technical Dashboard” production graphs (SECTION B), which
describes in more detail the performance of each specific rearing process.
Dashboard Menu (Sheet 1)
The main menu contains the options for accessing all the spreadsheet and display pages. It is
only available when the spreadsheet view is the active window. It contains the following main
options and menu items:
Figure 2. Dashboard menu, showing each of the sections for graphic display or data entry.
Introduction (Sheet 2)
The introduction page (GO TO INTRODUCTION) briefly describes the content and objectives
of the spreadsheet. This page also shows the sponsoring organizations, as well as the staff
involved in its development and this procedures manual.
Figure 3. Introduction page (Sheet 2).
5
SECTION A
The Manager’s Dashboard – Weekly Production Targets and Quality Control
Performance (Sheets 3 and 4).
These graphs allow managers to see the actual production and quality values reached each week
for specific process or development stage. The figures allow identifying gaps within the
production process or problems of quality performance for the biological material that was
produced or sent for field releases on that specific week (Figures 4 and 5).
Input in the data entry form (Sheet 8) automatically generates these sets of graphs:
Figure 4. Example of manager’s dashboard with charts of the weekly production
targets (Sheet 3).
Figure 5. Example of manager’s dashboard with charts of the weekly quality control
performance (Sheet 4).
6
SECTION B
Technical - Dashboard Production Graphs (Sheets 5, 6 and 7 - See Figure 2).
The daily production data entry sheet (Sheet 11) and the related production monitor database
(Sheet 12), which can be accessed in SECTION D, automatically generate a set of figures that
allow users and technical personnel to analyse in more detail the performance of main
production parameters for each of the insect developmental stages, such as egg, larvae and
pupae, which comprise the whole production process.
To facilitate data observation and analysis, each parameter is presented in graphs that
summarize the information every three months (four graphs per year); see Figure 6 as an
example.
Figure 6. Example of male only pupae production per week over a three months period
(Sheet 5).
There are several pages (Sheets 5, 6 and 7) that describe the rearing performance in the same
dashboard format as the one observed in Figure 6 (see Figure 7). All the performance
parameters and graphs can be accessed by pressing the desired tab at the menu page (SECTION
B, see Figure 2).
7
Figure 7. Daily egg production and egg recovery per oviposition cage dashboard, covering
the four quarters of the year (Sheet 7).
SECTION C
Daily and Weekly Data Entry for Production and Quality Control Graphs in The
Managers Dashboard (Sheet 8 – see Figure 2)
Input in this data entry sheet automatically generates a set of graphs that allow managers to see
the actual production and quality values reached for a specific process or development stage.
To generate the “MANAGER'S DASHBOARD – WEEKLY PRODUCTION AND
QUALITY GRAPHS” – a series of data must be entered using the form in the Sheet 8 (DAILY
DATA ENTRY X PROD & QC). These forms are not linked to the database, therefore data
entry must be done manually every week to generate new weekly charts for the “MANAGER'S
DASHBOARD - WEEKLY PRODUCTION AND QUALITY GRAPHS”.
The dashboard operator should be responsible for updating the information every week based
on the information generated by the production and quality control areas of the rearing facility.
This information should be verified by the laboratory director or production manager. (Figure
8).
8
Figure 8. Daily/weekly data entry for production and quality control manager’s dashboard (Sheet 8).
Initial Data Entry – Production Requirements (Sheet 9 – See Figure 2)
To generate the operational goals of the “Manager’s and Technical Dashboards” (SECTIONS
A and B), a series of data must be entered using this entry, located in Sheet 9 (Initial Data Entry
- Production Requirements, Figure 9).
The first table, Weekly Production Calculator (WPC) that needs to be filled with production
performance parameters is WPC-A. In this calculator, as well as in others that will be described
later, the cells having red numbers are the ones that require or allow user input. All the
information entered in these cells needs to be verified continuously in order to provide accurate
data for the calculation and monitoring process.
In WPC-A the required production per week needs to be defined initially based on the number
of operational days of the rearing facility. The next value that is required is the number of pupae
per litter. The following important value that needs to be entered is the number of larvae (in
litters) recovered per kilogram of larval diet (Appendix 1). This value is of major importance
to the rearing operation since it defines the productivity of the rearing process and determines
under real life rearing operations if the required production entered in the first cell of the WPC
will be achieved. Finally, the amount of diet placed on a rearing tray needs to be entered. This
is a variable number according to the rearing facility and species reared. This information
should be verified by the laboratory director or production manager.
This initial page sets up the calculations made elsewhere within the spreadsheet. Production
monitoring will be conducted based on this initial input.
The data entry points to be made by managers are shown in Red Colour on this page, as well
as throughout the entire spreadsheet.
9
Figure 9. Initial data entry – production requirements – in Weekly Production Calculator
(WPC) “A” (Sheet 9). Numbers in red allow users to define parameters based on their own
situation and production requirements.
Initial Data Entry - Calculator for Variable Number of Trays (Sheet 9)
Below the initial data entry table for WPC marked “A”, there is a separate calculator
(“CALCULATOR FOR VARIABLE NUMBER OF TRAYS”), which allows users to quickly
determine the production achieved with a variable set of conditions.
Figure 10. Production calculations for a variable number of trays (Sheet 9).
Additional Weekly Production Calculators WPC “B” and “C” (Figure 11) are placed below
the variable number of trays calculator and can be used to compare different production
scenarios to compare between your production needs and performance.
These two additional calculators are not linked directly to the monitoring component of the
“Dashboard”.
10
Figure 11. Additional weekly production calculators (WPC) “B” and “C” (Sheet 9).
SECTION D
Daily / Weekly Production Data Collection Form (Sheet 10 – Figure 2)
This page can be printed in hard copy or be used as an electronic form by the technicians or
supervisors of each rearing process to collect all data that are generated daily. The collected set
of data is used to fill the DAILY DATA ENTRY COLONY FORM (Sheet 11).
It is suggested that the information be entered on a daily basis. If this procedure is followed,
the dashboard information will be up to date all the time with just entering six sets of data that
are generated during the rearing process and collected by supervisors of each of the rearing
areas (Figure 12).
11
Figure 12. Daily / weekly production data collection form (Sheet 10).
Daily Production Data Entry Colony Form - Data Transfer (Sheet 11)
After collecting the daily and weekly production information by technicians and supervisors,
the data need to be entered in this electronic form: the “daily data entry collection form” (Sheet
11). All relevant information typed in will be transferred to generate a daily database from
which all the technical dashboard graphs are automatically prepared.
Figure 13. Production monitoring pages receive information to proceed to generate a
graphic representation of the production process (Sheet 11).
Production Monitor Database for Black Pupae Strain (Sheet 12)
Structure of the Database
Origin of the data:
Placed on the upper left-hand side of Sheet 12 (the “PRODUCTION MONITOR DATA”)
there is a small table explaining the origin of the data placed on this database (Figure 14).
Figure 14. Origin of the data on this table, showing that manual entry (ME) of statistics will
be required in four columns of the database (Sheet 12).
12
Most of the table is self-explanatory; however, there are few sets of data, mostly the result of
running basic statistical analysis of the actual production process, that need to be filled
manually on this database. This requirement is identified as “Manual Entry in this Spreadsheet
(ME)”.
The few instances when this entry is required will be shown as:
- Five times in the first cell in grey of the column that requires filling, - two times for DIET & TRAYS, and - three times for LARVAL PRODUCTION PERFORMANCE.
To process the full set of information, this spreadsheet “dashboard” collects and compiles
information in five distinctive rearing and production areas, as follows:
1.) Cages & Eggs Production Performance
This area of Sheet 12 collects the information on the number of cages in oviposition, amount
of eggs produced daily, as well as the required amount of eggs to reach the requested
production level (Figure 15).
Figure 15. Cages & eggs – production performance (Sheet 12).
2.) Diet & Trays – Diet Mixing Production Performance
This area of Sheet 12 collects the information relevant to the amounts of larval diet and
numbers of trays required to reach the required production goals (Figure 16).
13
Figure 16. Diet and trays – diet mixing production performance database (Sheet 12).
3.) Larval Production Performance
This area of Sheet 12 collects all the information related to the production achieved with the
larval diet, i.e. liters of larvae collected per tray and its productivity per kilogram (liters of
larvae per kilogram of diet). It also gives indications of the required amount of larvae per day
to reach the initially established production requirement (Figure 17).
Figure 17. Larval production performance (Sheet 12).
4.) Millions of Pupae & Irradiation
This area of Sheet 12 starts by establishing the amount of pupae per litter (this value needs to
be verified periodically because, this count is affected the pupae size). In this page, the
14
programme software calculates the millions of pupae produced at larval separation. In a
following column, a variable number of pupation days needs to be entered by the user. Based
on this an approximate irradiation date is proposed (Figure 18).
From the following four columns the only number that needs to be added by the user is the
actual number of millions of pupae that is exposed to irradiation. The following columns are
numbers that were calculated in the Initial Data Entry (Figure 9 – Sheet 9).
Figure 18. Millions of pupae produced and their respective irradiation information (Sheet
12).
5.) Male Only Sterile Pupae Production Data for Field Releases
All information presented in this area of the Sheet 12 is generated automatically. The main
information is the number of millions of insects irradiated per day compared against the
required number either daily or weekly (Figure 19).
Figure 19. Male only sterile pupae production for field release (Sheet 12).
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Diet Requirements (Sheet 13)
This sheet allows manual entry of the diet ingredients and their respective percentages that
are used at each rearing facility.
The calculations of the amounts of diet required to run the rearing operation are based on the
initial data entry for the desired production level. This section of the spreadsheet allows to
calculate automatically the consumption of those ingredients at the desired number of days,
information which can be useful for instance for provisioning, storage and daily diet
preparation (Figure 20).
Figure 20: Diet requirements and consumption
SECTION E – Production and Quality Control Standard
This section on production and quality control standards of the dashboard spreadsheet includes
as a reference the values of each of the parameters that measure the quality and the production
of mass-produced tephritid fruit flies.
Quality Control Standard Parameters (Sheet 14)
This section is divided into two units:
1.) Three quality control standards tables (2.1, 2.2, and 2.3) that are based on the latest version
of the Quality Control Manual for sterile insects, which serves as reference of what is
considered an acceptable insect product for tephritid fruit flies (http://www-
naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/QualityControl.pdf).
➢ Pupae weight of several species of tephritid fruit flies ➢ Percent emergence and flight ability ➢ Percent survival and longevity.
16
Figure 21: Example of the Quality control standards tables that will be displayed.
2.) Main standard production measurements that are used to determine and establish the values
of the performance of the production process, both the number of pupae per liter and number
of liters of larva recover per kilogram of diet are the key parameters used to assess the
production performance (these procedures are described in Appendix 1 of this manual).
3.) Other link of interest
User also can be interested on the utilization of “The FAO/IAEA Spreadsheet for Designing
and Operation of Insect Mass Rearing Facilities (http://www-naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/Spreadsheet-insect-mass-rearing.pdf)
http://www-naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/Spreadsheet-insect-mass-rearing.pdfhttp://www-naweb.iaea.org/nafa/ipc/public/Spreadsheet-insect-mass-rearing.pdf
17
Saving the Spreadsheet
This spreadsheet should be saved as an Excel 97-2003 workbook (*.xls). This format will allow
wider access by all users, including those with newer versions of the software.
Figure 22: Spreadsheet saving step A.
Figure 23: Spreadsheet saving step B.
When saving the file, in Excel 97-2003 workbook (*.xls) a message will show up on your
computer screen stating that some features will be lost if the file is saved in an earlier file
format. Please maintain the same format and press “Continue” to save the file in the same
format in which it was originally designed.
The spreadsheet can also be saved in newer versions of the software for personal use, but it
may require some verification that the transfer of data and formulas are operating as originally
intended.
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APPENDIX 1
Number of Pupae Per Liter
This value needs to be determined periodically because it is relevant for the final calculation
of the total amount of insects produced (normally measured in millions of pupae). The count
of pupae per liter is obviously affected by the pupal size, and pupal size is affected by the larval
yield per tray.
Number of Larvae (in Liters) Recovered per Kilogram of Larval Diet
Liters of larvae are determined by collecting and measuring the total volume of larvae collected
during the operational day. (Optionally it could be established by measuring the volume of
pupae, as for some species measuring larvae may be cumbersome). Most of the time, this
measurement is also carried out by separating the volumes by batch of diet during the work
day. This allows assessing the efficiency of the larval diet preparation and other changes in the
process (i.e. different diet, different diet ingredients, etc).
The amount of larvae is measured (hopefully without any foreign material that could increase
the volume established) using a graduated plastic beaker, usually of about 2.0 liters. For
Tephritidae, this volume is about the correct amount for placement in pupation trays (later the
volume could also be verified with the same tray using pupae).
*** TO CALCULATE LITERS OF LARVAE/KG OF DIET
AMOUNT OF KILOS/TRAY 6.50
LITERS OF LARVAE RECOVERED 0.8860
0.1363
FOR ADDED ACCURRACY OF L/Kg DIET CALCULATE A
MEAN VALUE OVER TIME USING THE GREEN TABS
1.) PROD. MONITOR-BISEX STRAIN
2.) PROD. MONITOR-BP STRAIN
LITERS OF LARVAE/KG OF DIET (l of L/kg) =
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